mishear

From Middle English misheren, from Old English mishȳran, mishīeran (“to hear amiss, not listen to, disobey”), equivalent to mis- +‎ hear.

• IPA^(key): /mɪsˈhɪə(ɹ)/

• Audio (Southern England):

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• Rhymes: -ɪə(ɹ)

mishear (third-person singular simple present mishears, present participle mishearing, simple past and past participle misheard)

1. (ambitransitive) To hear wrongly.

   I misheard when she asked for mints, and gave her mince instead.

   • 1883, Meeds Tuthill, The Civil Polity of the United States Considered in Its Theory and Practice, page 240:

     And if any mishear or misutter it, even that also serves, since it warns.

   • 1996 November 23, Caryn James, “From Hero To Heroin And Back”, in The New York Times‎:

     When a slickly handsome drug dealer named Legrand (Michael Beach, in the film's most seductive performance), first meets the teen-ager on the playground, he mishears the name Manigault. "Did he say Nanny Goat?" Legrand asks, explaining the nickname in one quick, witty stroke.

   • 2006 November 18, “Feedback”, in New Scientist‎, archived from the original on 24 May 2016, page 218:

     Our report of a relative who, as a child, thought the classic version of the Lord's Prayer began "Our father, a chart in heaven, Harold be thy name" stated that this type of mistake is known as an eggcorn. A number of readers have suggested that instances like this in which a whole phrase rather than just a word is misheard, should be called mondegreens rather than eggcorns.

2. To misunderstand. (Can we add an example for this sense?)

• lapsus auris

• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E Smith, editors (1911), “mishear”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “mishear”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

• meharis, mesirah, rameish